Hello and Hi!!

[algernon]

ZOOG MORNINGZA!!

hey dare! I'm off work today and woke up with almost every fear of change barking at my door. Why is this?

Habit.

First thing I think about is the existence of the barking, the chaotic bang of "what if's" like children selfish for 25 candy bars.

Next, I think about my stressed, uneasy feelings about this flurry and I know it's a long long time habit. I know the pattern.

I know once I'm out of bed, getting active, I begin to take hold. Mindfulness. REBT. Coffee and begin the work of living my life well.

My G F phoned and we spoke of my work issues and her morning so far. Nice to have that going and it's nice to have this forum to write in. I guess I'm journaling (and practicing my typing!) I am grateful for this.

My distressed feelings when all the barking thoughts come, is the C to the A in REBT and I think about the B that makes the the C squat in my skull. In this application, I think A and B, the AAAAActivating events and BBBBBeliefs are pretty much the same. Interesting. Usually A is APART from B, as in when that stupid deer suicided itself into my car last year as A and my immediate beliefs about it as B gave me my C, which was not too bad because my B was pretty healthy and the whole issue was resolved well enough.

But today my irrational beliefs are/is the activating event and I disputed(D) those beliefs as not my automatic destiny......nothing says I have to trust the worst of future outcomes when nothing has happened yet, particularly when I have control over much, if not ALL of the process! (thank you doctor Ellis!)

And then I practice mindfulness......made a little easier cuz I sat in full meditation yesterday as cluttered as it was with the "monkey mind"......

JUST PRACTICE, BABY!!

[algernon]

Hey dare!!

I see you posted new as I was composing my last post.

Interesting it is about mindfulness and my INexperience with it. Consider this:

Thinking about our troubling thoughts has, it seems, a practical purpose. We can measure and reason out the content in these thoughts. We deliberate on them, problem solve. This seems reasonable and mentally healthy to me.....

But, when these thoughts IMPOSE themselves uninvited, like the chaotic barking at my door from my earlier post, a state of distress takes place and that sucks......

So when we cannot stop (because we need to do other things) to engage REBT or take a pill or make a phone call to a support companion or whatever else.........we go with MINDFULNESS and keep these fucking monkey mind thoughts flowing right past us.

dare, I'm not dictating here, but trying to tie it all together so I understand it.

[dare i say it]

Hey algernon!

First of all, I'm impressed that you compose such thorough posts as you're just learning how to type! That's really something. Also, I'm glad that you can identify your barking thoughts for what they are and then take positive steps to dispute or counteract them. That sounds really healthy to me. Dealing with a possible job change is usually a very big thing, and so it's understandable that some troubling thoughts and feelings might come up. (I had to look up the A-B-C thing to refresh myself, but I get what you're saying now.)

I'm looking forward to watching some March Madness basketball--hoping my Michigan State Spartans can make another good run in the tournament this year. Go State!

[algernon]

I'm looking forward to watching some March Madness basketball--hoping my Michigan State Spartans can make another good run in the tournament this year. Go State!

[dare i say it]

Well, my bracket is totally shot now that Duke, Michigan, and Missouri lost. Luckily I don't gamble anymore. At least my Spartans won. Yay!

[algernon]

Hope your March madness b ball is going well, dare. I saw the headline for the Lehigh upset over Duke.

I usta get so into sports but it was better that I stopped. It's funny how oblivious I am to it all now. I do like sports in general. Baseball is a strangely ingenious game, complete with a player positioned OUTSIDE the boundaries of the playing field. I noticed all that heavy bling some bezbol players wear while playing. I don't see how they can play their best with all those chains and such swinging from their necks.

I had a good day, today. I had those creeping voices come into my head trying to impede me in my plans to leave my employer and I handled it well enough. Dispute them as mere bad habitual thinking and realize that these undesired thoughts are irrational.

I wish you all well!

[manuel_moe_g]

I had those creeping voices come into my head trying to impede me in my plans to leave my employer and I handled it well enough.

Outstanding Outstanding Outstanding and Outstanding yet again!

[algernon]

Hey Manny!!

Thank you for the cheerful posting!

I'm in a calm before the storm period of research, contemplation and physical work before I commence the upheaval of job changing. The experience is a well known one and not just in this forum. What is particular to us in this forum is the CONCERN and MANAGEMENT of one's own mind when change like this comes into being, the grind of the creeping thoughts.....the attack of the dreary doubters.....mind monsters and the melancholy ooze of their hateful folds.

Imagine what a perfectly noble endeavor......we in here look to balance ourselves.....and as there are many recipes for hummus(I'm big on it now, hummus), there are many ways to handle our mind gone wobbly, though not all ways work and some make it worse. That's the absolutely STELLAR common thread that brings us all to Paul Gilmartin's forum, how to handle and improve our rough going mentally. Lotsa resource reference and common suffering, thus expert experience to find like gold for the needy in here.

I'm reading "The Lost Art of Listening" by Michael P Nichols......which is also a study on how we speak......communicate.

Why is formal education so difficult to purchase? Society educated is a society optimized. I can never discount the priceless benefit of self-education, self study, books and all the rest beyond the hallowed halls of a $42,000 a year institution......and I'm doing it THAT way! (Abbie Hoffman style)

Imagine all we've learned about ourselves, our thinking.......the tools are many. Do we push to use these tools?

I know how I feel when despondent, not wanting to do anything but sleep or mush out.........waking up to dreary thoughts that are actually offensive and gratuitously cruel, thieving from my life the hopeful playout of a new day........

Imagine running a string of productive days for a sustained period? I think there may be an exponential effect in the boost of one's spirits when such a thing can be nailed down.

algernon, GET BUSY!!!

[fmperfectl]

good evening...morning? whatever...

houdini was a jew? i am a jew, too , but that doesn't mean i practice judaism.

how fortunate for you to be able to podcast on the job. maybe some of that literature is available on audio (reading and driving is likely frowned upon). since you are a truck driver, do you spend days away from home at a time, or are your runs shorter to where you are at home every night? if you do spend several days at a time on the road, how does that affect your depression? have you noticed any sort of pattern between your mental health and your home-or-away status?

[algernon]

Hello fmp!!

It's a delight to find your post opening with Harry Houdini who is a hero to me. I've been to his grave twice with my GF over in Queens. The two pennies with the little stone between them are what we left.

(note.....I attached a pic of Harry Houdini's grave figuring it would embed in this space after my first paragraph......so if you find it somewhere in the forum......it belongs.......HERE!!!)

As a trucker I cover a triangular range of Maine/Erie Pa./Richmond Va., with central NJ as the base of operations. There are also days I'm driving local, but that doesn't mean I can get to my beloved home during the week. End result is too, too long away from home over the last two years which causes me a depressed longing for home and though I'm with this same organization for 15 years now, all life-marking indicators are saying make a change to suit my pressing needs.

I'm in the process of seeking that change now. There is no particular dilemma for me that anyone doesn't have when seeking a new job, so I'm not unusual in that regard. The stress of change is there and the tools to deal with it are too. I will follow my sound reasoning and self-compassion. It's so good to know yourself and that is one great dividend of aging (I'm 57) that many young people do not yet have. (think about those fortunate YOUNG people that do really KNOW themselves that they can act in proper, rational self-regard)

Ya know, fmp.....funny to call you fmp instead of your real name.....I've gotten so much personal goodness and growth seeking answers to mental health issues that I've experienced......this for a long time now leading all the way to this very forum and beyond. Bravo!

Religious dogma does not work for me.

As a trucker, to return to your thoughtful question about depression and long time on the road......

......the reality of my primitive profession begs for a sincere industry response about your question to me, but sadly the drive for profit above all else marks my industry. Human drivers are little more than tires in the trucking business equation as a rule.

Though many trucking gigs are wonderful, satisfying affairs for those that craft them (husband wife teams that "tour" the country in top quality equipment at their own pace, owner operators most always, for example), others are endless grinds of hopeless solitude and constant road-born hostilities where everyone is a stranger and the return home is held in the hand of a callous dispatcher (essentially another stranger!)........

I fall between these two extremes as a trucker closer to the owner operator scenario. I suppose the point is, and apparently you grasp it fmp, there are many different trucking gigs and they vary vastly in the spectrum of such things. If we could walk through a truck stop, I could cite from one parked truck to another what its gig is with good accuracy. Anyone who's done this just half the time I have could do the same. Any journeyman knows his industry.

I have good resiliency in general and while working my long days away from home (I know I'm always home every Friday or early Saturday) I accept the reality of the deal and.......I make the very best of it. Though not luxurious travel, trucking is travel nonetheless and I'm superb at it.

Ahhh, my girlfriend and the cell phone (ALWAYS with a headset and never texting while driving) is the #1 comfort trucking, and my other loved ones too. Also, dividend wise I get to visit my GF once in a while trucking as we rendezvous on Long Island where she lives.

I was always a "shutterbug"....do they still use that term?.....and in these modern days of digital photography and video I'm always using my camera still amazed that no longer do I have to buy and process film hoping the klunker shots are few......I use my camera daily, the $110 snap-shooter and that makes me smile, and my loved ones too when I run the pics/vid for them later on. (all my years of digi-caming will yield some stunning pics that will help me win my next job I expect) Cameras were always a tool for travel because there's always new stuff to see.

Yes the iPod and MIHH podcast and the tons of music I have.....my sleeper is very comfortable and supplied with good food and books and a new notebook computer.....all very motivating to use and be absorbed by, anti-depression wise......and I exercise in single sets throughout the day and walk when the equipment is parked safe.

I've learned to listen to and connect with the people I meet in transit, and it's rewarding to see many years pass where I can return somewhere far and mutually greet that same person working there that I've known for all this time.

The farms, the graveyards, the rivers and lakes, the cities and villages and the Atlantic coast of my trucking range and the absolutely nowhere's where I stop to urinate wind at my back.......in every season and weather setting........these trucking moments that I've learned to grasp and stop into do wonders for the always-away-from-home depression that wants to bite me.

I've learned the term "situational depression" via this forum. I believe it's the "better" depression to have because personal determination can improve it, personal determination supported by education such as Albert Ellis' REBT and the ancient practice of meditation and mindfulness.

And finally, fmp.......again my original question on your intro posting......concerning your own mental health.....What will you do?